Past events

To kick off their 10th anniversary year, Ligeti Quartet take a snapshot tour of music by some of the most exciting and genre-defying composers working today in the UK and around the world.

Featuring music by John Adams, Anna Meredith, Tanya Tagaq, Ayanna Witter-Johnson, Soosan Lolavar and Laura Jurd.

An unveiling of pianist / composer Xenia Pestova Bennett’s exquisite limited-edition vinyl Atomic Legacies for Piano and String Quartet.

Described by Tempo (UK) as “a powerhouse of contemporary keyboard repertoire,” pianist and improviser Xenia Pestova Bennett launches her new album Atomic Legacies with a unique performance, combining the scintillating sonorities of extended piano technique with the virtuosity of the London-based Ligeti Quartet.

Trinity Laban CoLab Ensemble and special guests revisit the rebellious undercurrents of early ‘80s London and the ‘systems music’ scene, where classical minimalism met post-punk sensibility. Reinterpreting the sounds of Lost Jockey, Soft Jockey, Louis Andriessen and early works of Michael Nyman, Mercury-nominated instrumentalist Laura Jurd (Dinosaur) leads the evening, layering and deconstructing through improvisation and composition.

The Ligeti Quartet perform two pieces written for them in 2019. Firstly a brand new commission by Robin Haigh, his String Quartet which includes a tribute to scat singer Shooby Taylor, recorders (as always), an imitation of singing Samoyed dogs, and "technical death metal through a folk fiddle idiom". And then Tom Green's Solstice Songs, a reimagining of traditional festive tunes.

For our second year as quartet in residence, we'll be working with the PhD composers.

Venue: RHB 163

Alicja Pilarczyk (guest violin 1)
Patrick Dawkins (violin 2)
Richard Jones (viola)
Val Welbanks (cello)

Following their success at Open Circuit in March, the London-based Ligeti Quartet return with a programme that features realizations of video- and digital game-based musical scores including University of Liverpool Lecturer in Composition, Music for Digital Games Paul Turowski’s SQ2 (revised version), Maldonado Alvarez’s Traceurs, Takuto Fukada’s Super Colliders, and Johanna Ruotsalainen’s Hysteria.

Alicja Pilarczyk (guest violin 1)
Patrick Dawkins (violin 2)
Richard Jones (viola)
Val Welbanks (cello)

Erkki-Sven Tüür
The Wanderer's Evening Song

Olivier Messiaen
Cinq rechants

Judith Weir
blue hills beyond blue hills (BBC commission, world première)

A lunchtime concert in the presence of Raymond Warren followed by a drinks reception.

Including:

Warren: String Quartet No.2
Warren: A Star Danced for solo Cello and Chamber Orchestra.

Performed by the Ligeti Quartet & students from St Mary Redcliffe and Temple School, Bristol

Pianist, composer and improviser Xenia Pestova Bennett will curate a special afternoon featuring the Magnetic Resonator Piano, an exciting new instrument designed by the radical inventor Andrew McPherson. A grand piano will be completely transformed into a stunning acoustic cyborg with electromagnets suspended above the strings, allowing for control of minute details of shimmering resonance and gorgeous sustained tones.

The Contemporary Music Research Unit and PureGold present the final concert in the term-long Treatise Project, performed by the Ligeti Quartet.

For their final concert as Peter Maxwell Davies Ensemble in Residence, the Ligeti Quartet showcase three works by Cambridge University PhD composers, and the winner of Homerton College's 2019 Composition Competition.

Metastable Impressions: Artistic Representations of Molecular Dynamics

Come see and hear how we have used cutting edge deep learning, fine art and classical composition to communicate information from simulations of enzymes.

As newly appointed Resident Ensemble at Goldsmiths University, the Ligeti Quartet is doing a full day of composition workshops with students. 

Please get in touch with us if you would like to attend.

Time: 10:00-13:00 and 14:00-17:00

What does the brain sound like? Neuroscientist and composer Cliff Kerr explores what happens when performers become composers by translating their brain activity in real time into musical scores. Leveraging recent advances in non-invasive EEG hardware and time series analysis methods information is extracted from the brain.

• 6:45pm: Pre-concert talk with Cliff Kerr
• 7:30pm: Concert

What does the brain sound like? Neuroscientist and composer Cliff Kerr explores what happens when performers become composers by translating their brain activity in real time into musical scores. Leveraging recent advances in non-invasive EEG hardware and time series analysis methods information is extracted from the brain.

For their first appearance in Denmark, the Ligeti Quartet present three iconic works for string quartet with strong visual elements. Different Trains is presented with Beatriz Caravaggio's film, produced by ArsVideo Producciones in cooperation with the BBVA Foundation for the Museum of Fine Arts in Bilbao in 2016.

Music by students of the Royal Danish Academy of Music:

• Aaron Hudson: Insomnia
• Neli Pantsulaia: String Quartet
• Gustav Bjerre: String Quartet (first movement)
• Connor McClean: String Quartet No. 3
• Niklas Ottander: Proportion Två

Free entry

This event will feature the London-based Ligeti Quartet and will involve realizations of dynamic audiovisual scores that guide the production of sound & music as well as other interactive sonic visualizations. The programme will include selections from an international call for works as well as new works by University of Liverpool composers.

Ligeti Quartet perform a programme for International Women’s Day, featuring three pieces composed for them: Singing Strings (commissioned with the support of the RVW Trust), Mento Mood (commissioned by Cheltenham Festival) and Venus/Zohreh (commissioned by Live Music Sculpture &